The War Heist

by Ralph Dennis

  “How many …?”

  And he knew. He knew without listening to what Randy said, either his denial or his confession.

  “It wasn’t like they were family,” Randy said.

  “When did that ever make a difference to you?” He might have added some words about how Mama had died in the charity ward while Randy was on the chain gang, and how the worry she had about him had helped to kill her. He didn’t. He realized that his voice was too loud. He could see that the desk clerk was staring at him. He swallowed the rest of what he wanted to say and pulled his brother toward the door that led outside.

  He released Randy’s arm when they were on the sidewalk. Harry had given them directions to the building where the trucks were stored. He took a few seconds to get his bearings before he headed in that direction.

  Randy followed. He wore his hangdog look. “I swear I didn’t know it was going to hurt them.”

  “You insisted you had to do it. You remember?” Clark looked back at him. “You put in the whole bottle?”

  Randy dipped his head and looked away.

  That tore it. It ripped it all the way open.

  A heavy weight fell from Clark. He was free. He could breathe again. It was fresh air, breath that hadn’t been sucked out of his lungs by Randy.

  “I swear …”

  Clark looked at Randy’s I-am-sad act. He looked away. Lord, he thought, who is this stranger walking beside me who thinks he is my brother?

  “We’ll walk through it,” Harry Churchman said.

  He led the Gipsons down the street and across the back lot, toward the main street where the hotel was. It was a fair and bright day. The high-noon sun was drying the rain from the night before.

  “You’ll be issued handguns,” Harry said.

  “The two men you sent us drinking with in Halifax,” Clark said.

  Harry stopped. He looked puzzled. “What about them?”

  “They’re dead,” Clark said. “It was in the papers.”

  “Is that right?” Harry swung around and began walking again.

  Clark followed. “You interested in how it happened?”

  Randy, his head down, lagged a couple of steps behind.

  “Not especially.” Harry didn’t look at him. “Dead is dead, and there’s nothing you can do about that but pray.”

  Randy recovered. He saw that Harry wasn’t going to join in an attack on him. In his eagerness he stuttered. “You’re … talking … to the … right man … Harry. Clark knows how to pray.”

  Harry ignored Randy. He lifted a hand and patted Clark on the shoulder. “Look, that’s tough, but there’s nothing we can do about it now. It’s done.”

  They approached the train station.

  “Exactly at eight,” Harry said, “you two enter the train depot and take seats. You act like you’re waiting for a train or waiting for somebody who’s arriving on a train.”

  Him too, Clark thought. Lord, he is as bad as all the others.

  They walked around the station and climbed the steps to the platform. Harry leaned against a window and stared into the waiting room. “You handle a telegraph key?”

  “Like a beginner,” Randy said. “There’s no way I could fool anybody with my hand.”

  “But you read it?”

  “Some.”

  Harry turned to Clark. “You?”

  “About the same as him.”

  Harry put his back to the waiting room. “Then we don’t try to fool anybody. Nothing tricky. Soon as the action starts we close the train station down, telegraph and all.”

  “It’ll look suspicious.”

  “That’s right,” Randy said.

  “We’ll have to live with it.” Harry crossed the platform and started down the steps. Randy followed. Clark trailed them, several paces behind.

  It was two in the afternoon.

  The trees along the back lot threw long patches of shade here and there. Harry watched a young boy water a mule at the dark metal trough. The mule lowered his head until it was an inch or so from the water. It snorted to clear the green slime away. Then it began to drink.

  “It’s a nice little town,” Harry said.

  Constable Lafitte stood with his back to the sun. His face was in shadow, but Harry could read it like the headlines of a newspaper.

  “It can be pleasant in the spring and summer.”

  “How long have you lived here?” The boy grabbed the head harness on the mule and tried to pull him away. The mule snorted into the water again and wouldn’t move away.

  “Five years this fall,” Lafitte said.

  “You married? Own property here?”

  “Neither.”

  “Then you wouldn’t mind leaving town if you had to?”

  “If Mister Leveque wished it, I would.”

  “He say anything to you?” The mule had shown he couldn’t be forced. Now he backed away on his own. The boy led him down the street.

  “He said that I was to do what you said.”

  “It’s the same thing,” Harry said.

  “Is it?”

  “Take my word for it.”

  “If I must.” Lafitte nodded. “What am I to do?”

  Harry dropped his voice to just above a whisper. “All hell is going to break out at the train station a bit after nine tonight. I don’t want any trouble with the police. That means you. It also means the night man if he comes charging up and wants to mix in this business.”

  “I can handle Parsons.”

  “You got a jail cell over there?”

  “Two,” Lafitte said.

  “Might be Parsons could end up in one of them.”

  “It is possible.”

  “Besides that, the main problem could be the phones.” They talked for a few more minutes. At the end of it Lafitte returned to his office, and Harry went over and stared down at the horse trough.

  The coolness, the green feathery slime, made him think of summer days in Texas when he was a boy.

  It was a long, long time ago.

  At five that same afternoon Duncan MacTaggart sat on the cool fold-down steps of the last day coach, the one next to the caboose. After the slow, leisurely early afternoon there was a sudden increase of activity around the train.

  Mr. Craig and the other specialists from the Bank of England were deposited by a staff car at the far end of the pier a few minutes after five. MacTaggart watched them march the length of the train. When they reached him he moved to the side of the step to make room for them to pass.

  Craig let the others board the train before him. He peered at MacTaggart. “You look tired.”

  “You look rested.”

  “It was a pleasant visit.” Craig started past him.

  “See any Indians?”

  Craig stumbled and caught the rail to steady himself. “Not a one.”

  MacTaggart nodded. It was a thoughtful nod. Only after Craig went inside did he grin to himself. Maybe there were no Indians left in Canada.

  At half-five he heard the smart quick-step march and pushed himself from his seat on the coach stairs to watch the Canadian Army unit round the far end of the train and head straight for him. It was dress parade, the heavy boots in time and the hands swinging in the best British drill.

  He did his estimate. About sixty men and two officers. The ranking officer was a captain with a wide red mustache and a limp. About fifty, MacTaggart thought, and that probably meant the limp went back to World War I. The young lieutenant with him had the straight back and the airs of a man just out of military college. In his twenties and full of piss and vinegar and wanting his men to make an impressive show of it.

  The young lieutenant called his men to a halt one coach away from the spot where MacTaggart stood. The boots hit the pier like thunder and there was an echo in the stillness that followed.

  The captain left the lieutenant with his men and marched toward MacTaggart. He tried his best to conceal the limp. It was his left leg, up high near the hip joint.
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br />   “You’d be Mr. MacTaggart?”

  “I would.”

  “Captain McGuire.” He lifted a hand and gave a casual touch to his cap, a gesture that was almost a salute.

  “An Irishman in Canada?”

  “Why not? Did you think all Irishmen preferred the peat bogs?”

  “But you’re Canadian?”

  “Three generations,” Captain McGuire said.

  MacTaggart looked down the ranks of men. The row was straight as a line drawn with a ruler. “Your troops eaten yet?”

  “Not since lunch.”

  “Maybe you’d better see to that,” MacTaggart said.

  Captain McGuire turned. It was a slow, awkward movement that favored his bad hip. “Lieutenant.”

  The young officer arrived at a fast walk.

  “Mr. MacTaggart, Mr. Foster.”

  The young lieutenant put out his hand. MacTaggart took it and gave the boy a grin.

  “He believes we ought to see the men have a meal.”

  “Do we have time?”

  “An hour or so,” MacTaggart said.

  “Send them off with Sergeant Jones,” McGuire said.

  While Foster handled that detail, Captain McGuire paced in front of MacTaggart. When he stopped he grinned and said, “And our own supper?”

  MacTaggart waved a hand at the docked cruiser. “I have connections on the Emerald.”

  “Would you be a man who believes in a drink before supper?”

  “A taste of Irish?”

  “Man, are you serious?” Captain McGuire stared at him. “On the Emerald?”

  “In my kit,” MacTaggart said.

  Craig and the bankers had taken seats in the middle coach. The last coach was empty except for the three of them. MacTaggart passed the bottle. Lieutenant Foster, careful of his reputation, had only a token sip. The captain drank next, a full-throat quiver of a taste. MacTaggart matched him drop to drop.

  Captain McGuire stared out the window at the Emerald. His red hair and mustache were streaked with gray, and his eyes were a dark blue. “I was ordered to report to a Mr. MacTaggart, but I was not told what we were supposed to be guarding.”

  MacTaggart held the bottle to the light. It was the last of the bottles, and there was only a quarter of it left. He tipped the bottle and had about half a sip. He ran that around his tongue before he swallowed. “Valuables,” he said.

  “Valuables?” Captain McGuire took the bottle and allowed himself a polite sip that matched the one his host had taken. The young lieutenant shook his head at the offered bottle. McGuire inserted the cork and tapped it lightly with the palm of his hand. “I hope you are not one of those closemouthed Scots,” he said.

  “Later.” MacTaggart took the bottle and placed it in his bag. “I think it’s time we did our begging at the Emerald.” He stood.

  “How’s the food aboard ship?” Lieutenant Foster wanted to know.

  “Better since we reached port,” MacTaggart said.

  Leading the way, going up the Emerald’s gangplank, he turned and looked back at the train. The four-man watch was still in place. There had been no lapses since the night before.

  CHAPTER TWENTY NINE

  The weapons’ check at the run-down building they’d rented began a few minutes after five. Harry and Gunny handled the check-out and the assignment.

  Handguns for the Gipsons. These were the target pistols Harry had stolen in New York. They’d been used in the bank robbery in Renssler, and they’d been packed over the border in Gunny’s heavy suitcase.

  Harry passed them, butt first, to Randy and Clark. “Pack them in a gym bag or a big paper sack. Too much bulk to stuff them under your shirts.”

  “I’d rather have a Thompson.” Randy tilted his head toward the trap on the tailgate of one of the Mack Bulldogs. “One of them.”

  Gunny looked away. It wasn’t worth discussing. He left it to Harry.

  “I don’t think so. The ticket clerk probably won’t be armed. How’re you going to explain walking in with a Thompson under your arm?”

  “A shotgun then.”

  “Same answer,” Harry said. He put his back to Randy. Henri Leveque was next. “How about you?”

  Leveque shook his head. There were two Thompsons in the boot of the Cadillac and the .44 revolver for himself. “We came prepared.”

  “You, Gunny?”

  “The pump gun.”

  That left Thompsons for Captain Whitman, Major Renssler, Richard Betts, Vic Franks, and the last one for Harry.

  Gunny passed around the spare drums for the Thompsons. The whole matter hadn’t taken more than fifteen minutes.

  Harry sent the Gipsons and Henri Leveque’s men, Jean and Pierre, away to an early supper. Their part in the operation was already established. After eating, the Gipsons would remain at the hotel until time to leave for the train station. Henri’s men, when they’d completed their meal, would return and wait at the barn until eight o’clock, the set hour for their departure for Positions A and C.

  “It might be a good sign. We’re running early. Any objections to going on to the briefing?” Johnny looked around and nodded to himself. “I guess there isn’t. All right, the main strike …”

  “How large a part of the train are we speaking about?” Henri Leveque asked.

  “One boxcar.”

  “The correct one?”

  Johnny passed that answer to Harry Churchman. “Unless there was a mistake in Halifax,” Harry said.

  “I would hate to involve myself in an illegal activity and discover that it was not worth it.”

  “It’ll be worth it,” Tom said.

  “The Crown jewels?”

  “If we’ve crippled the right boxcar.”

  “And if you haven’t?”

  “Other valuables,” Tom said.

  “What other valuables?”

  “Goddammit.” Johnny pushed past Harry and faced Leveque. “If we don’t get this operation organized, it’s not going to matter what’s in the boxcar. Your percentage of nothing is nothing, and that’s the Lord’s truth.”

  Henri absorbed the burst of anger. He let it blunt itself on him. Then he gave Johnny a humorless smile and backed away. “First things first? I believe that is an American expression as well?”

  “Does that mean I can get on with it?”

  Henri dropped his chin on his chest and didn’t answer.

  The briefing meeting broke up at six-thirty.

  Gunny remained with the trucks and the weapons. He’d have his supper after the Frenchman’s two men returned. Not that he would eat much. A light meal before a fight, that was the soldier’s maxim. It was a truth that went back to his time riding along the Mexican border and his tours in the trenches in France during the Big One. Stomach wounds and gut shots, the advice went, healed better if you didn’t have a mess of undigested food in you.

  Soft scrambled eggs, some dry toast, and a cup of hot tea. That kind of supper. Nothing heavy. Only what would be digested fast and leave you empty.

  At the hotel Henri Leveque stopped in the lobby. The Americans, led by the captain, brushed past him and headed into the dining room without inviting him to join them. Henri followed them as far as the dining room entrance. Satisfied that they were seated and about to order, he backed away and returned to the desk.

  “Has anyone asked for me?”

  “Two men,” the desk clerk said.

  “Where are …?”

  “They rented a room.” The clerk turned the hotel registry toward him. “They are in Room Four-ten.”

  “Where’s the Frenchie?” Harry lowered his menu and looked around the dining room.”

  “A gentleman like him?” Johnny said. “He’s in his room pouring on some more perfume before supper.”

  “You never get enough of that,” Harry said.

  Tom placed the menu on his plate. “You think this is going to work?”

  “This partnership?”

  “Yes.”

  “
It was going to work before these clowns forced their way into it. Now it’s going to work with them or in spite of them.” Johnny shrugged. “To hell with him. God, I’m starved.”

  “Gunny says to eat light,” Harry said.

  “That old soldier’s tale?”

  “Might be. But you know what?”

  “What?”

  “I look around this patchwork army and I don’t see anybody but Gunny who’s been in a war.”

  “With lungs like cheesecloth, he’s worried about his stomach?” Johnny waved a hand at a passing waiter. “Ready to order here.”

  Harry Churchman ordered a small steak, rare, and toast and hot tea.

  The others ordered full dinners.

  The two men in Room 410 looked like lumberjacks. They wore cord trousers, flannel shirts, and heavy boots. They smelled of old, dry sweat and rum.

  Henri introduced himself and had his careful look at them. They were cousins, but they could have been twin brothers. Both had square, blocky bodies, weathered faces, and close-cropped black hair that might have been cut using a bowl as a pattern.

  They were the Bouchards, Pete and Charlie.

  “You brought the truck?”

  “There was no truck to bring.”

  “Didn’t the people in Quebec …?”

  Pete was the older of the Bouchards. He did the talking. “I told them we had no truck. I said if we needed one we could steal it here in Wingate Station.”

  It made a certain kind of sense. And there was no way that Leveque could argue with them. If he argued that they had not done what he ordered, there was still no truck. Arguments did not furnish a truck.

  “Do you have weapons?”

  They didn’t. He gave that some thought. Finally he left the hotel with them through a side entrance and escorted them to the police station. There he turned them over to Lafitte, who was just returning from his first rounds of the evening.

  Lafitte would tell them where there was a truck they could steal and where they could hide it until it was needed. And he would keep the Bouchards with him until the action at the train yard began.

  Henri entered the hotel dining room as the Americans were leaving and heading back to the seed-and-feed building.